WolfDAO Newsletter - #21
Farm up to 130% APR with Vesta Finance Staking! Read more about OpenSea, Ontology, CryptoPunks NFT, BlockFi, Bitfinex, and other protocol happenings.
N️ow earn up to 130% APR with Vesta Finance Staking
Vesta Protocol, an L2-first lending protocol on Arbitrum, announced its mainnet launch. Vesta has VST as the project's stablecoin and lets users borrow against collateral without any interest. VSTA-ETH is a more volatile (higher-yield) farm generating around 130% APR presently. The process is simple as you need to deposit into Balancer's VSTA-ETH pool on Arbitrum to acquire LP tokens. Head over to the VSTA-ETH pool and confirm the transaction. Next, go to Vesta's LP token staking dashboard and stake the LP tokens received from the previous step. Finish the staking process and start collecting VSTA rewards. Although Vesta has been audited, we request our users to approach the farm with caution.
OpenSea CEO Says NFT Exploit Was Likely a 'Phishing Attack'
After several users reported that NFT from the Cool Cats and Doodle collections were stolen, OpenSea is investigating rumors of an exploit on the popular Ethereum NFT marketplace. However, CEO Devin Finzer tweeted that the exploit didn't hit OpenSea but targeted the people who rely on the market to trade and maintain their digital assets.
The CEO tweeted, "As far as we can tell, this is a phishing attack." In simple words, people may have received official-looking emails that tricked them into moving their NFTs into someone else's wallet. EtherScan has labeled the address as Fake_Phishing5169 with a balance of over 641 ETH.
Continuing to the theory of Finzer, the attacker(s) might have picked an optimal time to go phishing. On February 18, OpenSea released a new smart contract and asked users to migrate their holdings. Ironically, the new smart contract came about to prevent a different type of exploit—one which saw holders unwittingly sell their assets at bargain-basement prices.
Ontology
Ontology came into the frame to unite blockchain technology with the business sector. The platform provides businesses to use Ontology that does not have prior knowledge of distributed networks as it is a high-performance, open-source blockchain specializing in digital identity and data.
Ontology has focussed on the significant problems in the market space, such as poor privacy protection, untapped data value, data management monopolization, and ineffective identity authentication. The platform proudly resolves all the issues with its solid trust ecosystem.
The platform creates multiple blockchains built atop the main Ontology blockchain and helps widen the search for businesses. It also supports Layer 2 scalability making it a choice among industry leaders.
The exciting offering of Ontology is it enables businesses to create customized blockchains to fit their specific needs. Unlike Ethereum, Ontology allows companies to add governance and enhanced privacy features in the blockchain. Transaction fees are low as Ontology generates and distributes the Ontology Gas token to ONT holders.
CryptoPunks Ethereum NFT sold for 8,000 ETH
CryptoPunk #5822 broke the previous record by one sale of nearly $24 Million (8000 ETH). Deepak Thapliyal purchased the NFT directly from CryptoPunks developer Larva Labs' online marketplace. Deepak was able to buy the NFT by taking leverage via Compound Finance. The new Punk is very rare as only 9 out of the entire collection of 10,000 avatars are aliens.
BlockFi will Pay $100M Penalty to settle ongoing investigations from U.S. SEC
BlockFi (Crypto lending platform) has agreed to pay a sum of $100 million to settle ongoing investigations from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The report stated that the platform would discontinue new high-yield accounts for most U.S. residents. The SEC alleged that the BlockFi Interest account delivering 5 to 10% yields are unregistered securities that led to the commotion. The settlement amount is also one of the largest-ever cryptocurrency enforcement actions.
Bitfinex hack involving ~120,000 Bitcoin got the interest of Netflix
Netflix will soon produce a documentary series on the infamous Bitfinex hack — one of the biggest financial crimes from 2016 stealing 119,756 Bitcoin (BTC). The documentary will revolve around a New York-based couple tying them to the crime. According to the announcement, "Netflix has ordered a documentary series about a married couple's alleged scheme to launder billions of dollars worth of stolen cryptocurrency in the biggest criminal financial crime case in history."
IRA Financial Hacked for $36M in Bitcoin and Ethereum
IRA Financial Trust revealed that hackers stole around $36 Million ($21M in Bitcoin and $15M in Ethereum) from retirement accounts. The company manages individual retirement accounts in non-traditional assets and has been dealing with allegations of a significant hack for nearly a week. The company tweeted that it had "discovered suspicious activity that has affected a limited subset of our customers with accounts on the Gemini cryptocurrency exchange."
DeFi Protocol Ref Finance Raises $4.8M
Ref Finance has raised $4.8 Million in a strategic OTC sale led by Jump Crypto. Ref Finance is an automated market maker (AMM) and stableswap marketplace built on Near Protocol. The platform aims to bring together DeFi tools, including a decentralized exchange (DEX), lending protocol, and synthetic asset issuer in a one stop shop. The funds will help the protocol build its vision of a "one stop shop" for DeFi in the Near Protocol ecosystem.
Federal Reserve Bans Officials From Trading Stocks, Crypto
Federal reserve has restricted the senior staff to hold cryptocurrencies, among other assets such as stocks. In an announcement from the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), the new rules stated that officials could no longer buy crypto, individual stocks, or sector funds or hold investments in individual bonds, agency securities, commodities, or foreign currencies.